Blogs | Mother Joneshttp://www.motherjones.com/Blogs/2009/08/succession-politics-and-health-care-reform/politics/2002/11/.http%3A/www.boston.com/news/politics/2002/11/http%3A/www.%24kapalpinisi.blogspot.com/photos/whitehouse/3818150328
http://www.motherjones.com/files/motherjonesLogo_google_206X40.pngMother Jones logohttp://www.motherjones.com
enLet's Cool It On the "Fake News" Ironyhttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/lets-cool-it-fake-news-irony
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>Over at <em>National Review</em>, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/442936/andy-puzder-fake-news-trump-labor-secretary-minimum-wage-increase" target="_blank">James Sherk has a complaint:</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>President-elect Trump has picked Andy Puzder, the CEO of CKE Restaurants (i.e. Carl&rsquo;s Jr. and Hardee&rsquo;s) for labor secretary. <strong>Amusingly, the media coverage of his nomination has been dominated by . . . fake news.</strong> Several outlets have reported that Puzder opposes increasing the minimum wage. That&rsquo;s not exactly true.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Forget the Puzder stuff. His view on the minimum wage is a little hard to pin down. My objection is to the overuse of "fake news." There are two things that can qualify:</p>
<ul><li>Stuff that's literally made up and passed off as real. The most famous example is <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/11/heres-how-facebook-got-worked-election" target="_blank">here.</a></li>
<li>Wild conspiracy theories passed around on Facebook pages and crank websites.</li>
</ul><p>"Fake news" is a useful concept, but not if we start using it to refer to anything we think is wrong or biased or not fully reported. We already have good words for this kind of stuff, ranging from "not the whole story" to "outright lie." We don't need to ruin a perfectly good phrase by using it where it really doesn't fit.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumSat, 10 Dec 2016 01:09:11 +0000Kevin Drum321166 at http://www.motherjones.comThe Scriptwriter for "The Trump Show" Needs to Get a Griphttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/scriptwriter-trump-show-needs-get-grip
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p><a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/exxons-rex-tillerson-is-top-candidate-for-secretary-of-state-1481318464" target="_blank">From the <em>Wall Street Journal</em>:</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>Exxon Mobil Corp. Chief Executive Rex Tillerson has emerged as the leading candidate to become President-elect Donald Trump&rsquo;s pick for secretary of state, according to two transition officials, marking the latest twist in a multiweek search for a top diplomat.</p>
<p>....Among those considered for the post, Mr. Tillerson has perhaps the closest ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, having negotiated a 2011 energy partnership deal with Russia that Mr. Putin said could eventually be worth as much as $500 billion. In 2012, the Kremlin bestowed the country&rsquo;s Order of Friendship decoration on Mr. Tillerson.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Oh come on. Trump is planning to nominate a wealthy, inexperienced fossil-fuel mogul whose only qualification&mdash;literally&mdash;is that he's sort of chummy with Vladimir Putin? And Republicans are expected to confirm him?</p>
<p>Who's writing the script for this show? No one's going to believe these plot twists. I gave up on <em>Designated Survivor</em> after a couple of episodes, and it was more realistic than this.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumSat, 10 Dec 2016 00:30:33 +0000Kevin Drum321161 at http://www.motherjones.comFriday Cat Blogging - 9 December 2016http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/friday-cat-blogging-9-december-2016
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>For years we've had a regular feline visitor to our house. However, a few days ago, for the first time I can remember, he visited during daylight hours. This caused considerable alarm, and in the ensuing dustup both of our cats somehow ended up on the roof. I'm not quite sure how or why, but after it was all over they roamed around for a while and then settled down on the patio cover. As you can see, Hilbert is keeping a watchful eye out for any further invasions of his territory.</p>
<p>Speaking of territory, the Downing Street mouse problem has still not been solved. So now, in addition to Larry, Palmerston, and Gladstone, the staff has added a mother and son pair of cats, Evie and Ossie. We now have an army of five cats on Downing Street patrol. Would you like to see them and hear about all the inside dirt? (Turf wars! Dog terrorizing! Tarantulas!) This is the kind of thing for which tabloids are really and truly your best source. Forget the <em>Guardian</em>. I recommend <a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2364025/downing-street-welcomes-two-new-cats-evie-and-ossie-to-help-catch-mice-in-the-cabinet-office/" target="_blank">the <em>Sun</em></a> or <a href="http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/meet-evie-ossie-westminster-gets-9426154" target="_blank">the <em>Mirror</em></a> for this story.</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_hilbert_2016_12_09.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #000000; margin: 15px 0px 5px 60px;"></p></body></html>
Kevin DrumFri, 09 Dec 2016 19:56:54 +0000Kevin Drum321136 at http://www.motherjones.comTrump Still Blowing Off Intelligence Briefingshttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/trump-still-blowing-intelligence-briefings
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>A few years ago, conservatives raised an alarm over the fact that President Obama didn't receive an in-person intelligence briefing every day. Sometimes, it turned out, he met with the briefer, but other times he just read the briefing material. This was deemed a major threat to national security.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-briefings-idUSKBN13X2M9" target="_blank">So how about Donald Trump?</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>President-elect Donald Trump is receiving an average of <strong>one presidential intelligence briefing a week,</strong> according to U.S. officials familiar with the matter, far fewer than most of his recent predecessors....Trump has asked for at least one briefing, and possibly more, from intelligence agencies on specific subjects, one of the officials said. The source declined to identify what subjects interested the president-elect, <strong>but said that so far they have not included Russia or Iran.</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<p>My guess is that Trump (a) thinks he already knows everything he needs to know, and (b) is afraid the briefings might force him to acknowledge things he doesn't want to believe. In any case, he's going to be president pretty shortly, and surely Republicans are deeply concerned about his apparent lack of interest in the intelligence community's reports.</p>
<p>Right?</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumFri, 09 Dec 2016 19:42:30 +0000Kevin Drum321126 at http://www.motherjones.comThe House GOP Just Revealed Its Plan To Cut Social Securityhttp://www.motherjones.com/contributor/2016/12/republicans-want-to-cut-social-security
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>Late Thursday, Congressman Sam Johnson (R-TX), the Chairman of the House Social Security subcommittee, introduced <a href="http://samjohnson.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=398516" target="_blank">a bill to "reform" (i.e. cut) Social Security.</a></p>
<p>Josh Marshall <a href="http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/going-for-the-big-enchilada" target="_blank">warns</a>, "Republicans apparently aren't going to be satisfied with phasing out Medicare. They're going to try to pass huge cuts to Social Security this year too. Not Bush-style partial phaseout but just big, big cuts. And you're out of luck even if you're a current beneficiary. "</p>
<p>The <em>Washington Examiner</em> describes it <a href="http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/key-gop-lawmaker-introduces-social-security-reform-plan/article/2609233" target="_blank">thusly</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The bill&hellip;would reduce costs by changing the benefits formula to reduce payments progressively for high earners. It would also gradually raise the full retirement age from 67 to 69 for people who are today 49 or younger. Lastly, it would change the inflation metric used to calculate benefits to one that shows lower inflation, essentially slowing the growth in benefits, and eliminate cost of living adjustments for high earners.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>You can read the full bill below. Democrats are <a href="http://www.democraticleader.gov/newsroom/12916/" target="_blank">not pleased</a>.</p>
<div class="DC-embed DC-embed-document DV-container" id="DV-viewer-3235010-The-House-GOP-Just-Introduced-A-New-Bill-To-Cut">&nbsp;</div>
<script src="//assets.documentcloud.org/viewer/loader.js"></script><script>
DV.load("https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3235010-The-House-GOP-Just-Introduced-A-New-Bill-To-Cut.js", {
width: 630,
height: 400,
sidebar: false,
text: false,
pdf: false,
container: "#DV-viewer-3235010-The-House-GOP-Just-Introduced-A-New-Bill-To-Cut"
});
</script></body></html>
ContributorFri, 09 Dec 2016 19:20:50 +0000Ben Dreyfuss321121 at http://www.motherjones.comWho Will Write Us a Syllabus for Sneerology 101?http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/who-will-write-syllabus-sneerology-101
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>Paul Krugman notes today that all of us coastal elites actually do more for the recently famous white working class than Republicans do, but the working class folks still don't like us because they think we look down on them. <a href="http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/12/09/fast-food-damnation/" target="_blank">He's a little puzzled about this:</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>Do the liberals sneer at the Joe Sixpacks? <strong>Actually, I&rsquo;ve never heard it</strong> &mdash; the people I hang out with do understand that living the way they do takes a lot more money and time than hard-pressed Americans have, and aren&rsquo;t especially judgmental about lifestyles. <strong>But it&rsquo;s easy to see how the sense that liberals look down on regular folks might arise, and be fanned by right-wing media.</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<p>I'm not here to get into a fight with Krugman, but come on. Sure, the right-wing media fans the flames of this stuff, but is there really any question that liberal city folks tend to sneer at rural working-class folks? I'm not even talking about stuff like abortion and guns and gay marriage, where we disagree over major points of policy. I'm talking about lifestyle. Krugman talks about fast food, and that's a decent example. Working-class folks <em>like</em> fast food,<sup>1</sup> which explains why Donald Trump liked to show pictures of himself <img align="right" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_branson_dolly_dixie.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #000000; margin: 20px 0px 15px 30px;">eating McDonald's or KFC. It's a sign that he's one of them. Ditto for Trump's famous trucker hat. (Did you even know that <a href="http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-trump-hats-cali-fame-carson-20151124-story.html" target="_blank">it's a trucker hat,</a> not a baseball cap? He did.)</p>
<p>If I felt like this was something that actually needs evidence, I could produce a million examples in a very short time. But everyone gets this, don't they? We sneer at their starchy food. We sneer at their holy-roller megachurches. (But not at black churches; never that.) We sneer at their favorite TV shows. We sneer at their reading habits. We sneer at their guns. We sneer at their double-wides. We sneer at the tchotchkes that litter their houses. We sneer at their supermarket tabloids. We sneer at their music. We sneer at their leisure activities. We sneer at their blunt patriotism. We sneer at&mdash;</p>
<p>Again: come on. Maybe <em>you personally</em> don't do it&mdash;though judging from the comments here, a lot of you do&mdash;but you hardly need to be an anthropologist to recognize that this kind of sneering shows up on TV, in newspapers, on Twitter, in books, on Facebook, and in private conversations all the time. It's hard to believe that anyone is really blind to this.</p>
<p>Now, it's true that they also sneer at us. Fair enough. But as all good liberals know, there's a big difference between a powerful group sneering at a vulnerable group, and vice versa. The former is a far bigger problem. And we educated city folks are, on average, far richer and more powerful than ruralish working-class folks. Our sneering has a power component that theirs doesn't. I confess that it's fun, and I enjoy my share of sneering in private, but I also accept that this attitude has political costs.</p>
<p>Anyway, I'm curious: do you accept this? Is it as obvious to you as it is to me? Or do you think I'm overstating things? Do I really need to make my case in more detail?</p>
<p><sup>1</sup>So do I. Except for McDonald's.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumFri, 09 Dec 2016 19:17:41 +0000Kevin Drum321116 at http://www.motherjones.comAmerican Media Suffering From Desperate Lack of Pro-Trump Voiceshttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/american-media-suffering-desperate-lack-pro-trump-voices
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>It turns out that a lack of manufacturing jobs is not America's only problem. There's also a lack of columnists <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/mainstream-media-puts-out-the-call-for-pro-trump-columnists/2016/12/09/2153fdd2-bca7-11e6-94ac-3d324840106c_story.html" target="_blank">willing to defend Donald Trump:</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>As they discovered during the long campaign season, the nation&rsquo;s newspapers and major digital news sites &mdash; the dreaded mainstream media &mdash; are facing a shortage of people able, or more likely willing, to write opinion columns supportive of the president-elect. Major newspapers, from <em>The Washington Post</em> to the <em>New York Times</em>, have struggled to find and publish pro-Trump columns for months. So have regional ones, such as the Des Moines Register and Arizona Republic, which have a long history of supporting Republican candidates.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Here's the problem: these folks are not looking for writers who will defend particular Trump policies from time to time. They want columnists who will <em>regularly</em> defend <em>all</em> Trump policies. And here's the catch: they want people who are non-insane.</p>
<p>That's hard. But perhaps it's a business opportunity for me. I could do this, I think, if I put my mind to it, but for obvious reasons of self-respect and the loss of all friends and family, the pay would have to be very high. So the question is, just how desperate is the media for a seemingly rational pro-Trump voice? Are they willing to pool their efforts to make me a highly-paid syndicated columnist who defends Trump no matter what he does?</p>
<p>Let's see how serious they are. Show me the money, people.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumFri, 09 Dec 2016 17:55:52 +0000Kevin Drum321111 at http://www.motherjones.comSwamp Watch - 9 December 2016http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/swamp-watch-9-december-2016
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>According to reports, Trump will nominate Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) as Secretary of the Interior. After a run of three outsiders, this means we're back to the swamp for Trump's cabinet. She's a fairly standard issue Republican by contemporary standards, and naturally she hates any environmental regulations that might actually save our interior for future generations.</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_trump_cabinet_2016_12_09_0.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 5px 0px;"></p></body></html>
Kevin DrumFri, 09 Dec 2016 16:26:05 +0000Kevin Drum321096 at http://www.motherjones.comPrediction: Terrorism in the Middle East Will Decline By Half Between 2020 and 2040http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/prediction-terrorism-middle-east-will-decline-half-between-2020-and-2040
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>You guys are way too smart. I posted my mystery map of the Middle East yesterday morning, and in less than an hour you had figured out what it represented. For the rest of you, here's the map with its real title:</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_middle_east_leaded_gasoline_phaseout_0.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 15px 0px;"></p>
<p>I'm going to make an obvious point about this, but I want to make it carefully. Ever since I wrote my piece about <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2016/02/lead-exposure-gasoline-crime-increase-children-health" target="_blank">the link between violent crime and leaded gasoline,</a> I've gotten periodic questions about whether lead might be responsible for other things. The most common answer is <em>maybe</em>&mdash;but it's unlikely we'll ever have the data to prove it. For that reason, I try to stay pretty restrained about exactly what lead might and might not be responsible for.</p>
<p>That said, there's a lot of evidence that leaded gasoline produced a wave of violent crime between 1960-1990 in the developed world, and that the introduction of unleaded gasoline eliminated that wave and eventually brought crime rates down nearly to 1960 levels. In most developed countries, leaded gasoline was phased out starting around the mid-70s, which benefited children born after that. When those children reached their late teenage years in the early 90s, they were much less prone to impulsiveness and aggression, which led to lower crime rates.</p>
<p>But not every part of the world followed that timetable. In particular, leaded gasoline continued to be used in the Middle East up through the late 90s. Egypt began phasing it out in 1998, and most other countries followed over the next decade or so. Only a few&mdash;including Iraq and Afghanistan&mdash;still sell significant amounts of leaded gasoline.</p>
<p>Since lead poisoning affects infants, its affects show up about 18-20 years later. What this means is that in the bright red countries, the cohort of kids who reach their late teen years around 2020 should be significantly less aggressive and violent than previous cohorts. Around 2025 the countries in lighter red will join them. Around 2030 the countries in pink will join. By 2040 or so, the process will be complete.</p>
<p>Obviously this means that crime rates in the Middle East should decline steadily between 2020-40. But there's more. Given the effects of lead, it seems almost certain that reducing lead poisoning in teenagers and young adults should lead to a decline in terrorism as well.</p>
<p>This is where I want to be careful. Obviously terrorism, like crime, has a lot of causes. What's more, you could eliminate every molecule of lead in the world and you'd still have plenty of crime and plenty of terrorism. But you'd have <em>less</em>. If terrorism follows the path of violent crime, eliminating leaded gasoline could reduce the level of terrorism by 50 percent or more.</p>
<p>It's also possible&mdash;though this is much more speculative&mdash;that effective terrorism requires a minimum critical mass of people who are drawn to it. If you fall below that minimum, it might wither away. In other words, it's possible that removing lead from gasoline could reduce terrorism by even more than 50 percent.</p>
<p>In any case, this leads to a concrete prediction: Between 2020 and 2040, the level of terrorism emanating from the Middle East will drop by at least half. Ditto for violence more generally, including civil wars. In a decade or so, we should begin to get hints of whether this prediction is correct.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumFri, 09 Dec 2016 14:45:09 +0000Kevin Drum321076 at http://www.motherjones.comIn Flint, 99% of Homes Are Safe As Long As They Have a Water Filterhttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/flint-99-homes-are-safe-water-filter
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p><img align="right" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_flint_lead_percentage_homes.jpg" style="margin: 8px 0px 15px 30px;">Here's another look at the current state of water in Flint. Instead of an average, it shows the number of homes with different levels of lead in their tap water. The data (<a href="http://www.michigan.gov/flintwater/0,6092,7-345-76292_76294_76297---,00.html" target="_blank">here</a>) is for the entire month of November (11/3 through 12/1) and covers 493 homes. The testing is done with unfiltered water.</p>
<p>About 87 percent of homes have lead content of 5 parts per billion or less. This is safe for anyone, even small children. Another 9 percent have lead content of 6-15 ppb. This is probably safe for adults, and safe for children if it's filtered. Another 3 percent have lead levels between 16-100 ppb. This is unsafe unless filtered. Finally, about 1 percent of homes have lead levels above 100 ppb, which might be unsafe even if it's filtered.</p>
<p>The filters are critical here. About 99 percent of Flint homes have safe water as long as a filter is properly installed and maintained. Replacing Flint's service lines will take a long time, and in the meantime the emphasis should be almost exclusively on making sure everyone has a working filter. Only a tiny percentage of houses still need to be using bottled water.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumFri, 09 Dec 2016 05:52:55 +0000Kevin Drum321071 at http://www.motherjones.comHoo Boy, Democrats Sure Do Hate Trump's Cabinethttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/hoo-boy-democrats-sure-do-hate-trumps-cabinet
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p><img align="right" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_losing_party_approval_cabinet.jpg" style="margin: 8px 0px 15px 30px;">Polls from Pew Research always have lots of interesting tidbits, <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2016/12/08/low-approval-of-trumps-transition-but-outlook-for-his-presidency-improves/" target="_blank">and today's is no exception.</a> One question was about approval of cabinet choices, and Donald Trump ranks the lowest of any recent president. But you have to dig down a bit to get the real news.</p>
<p>It turns out this doesn't represent disapproval across the board. Members of Trump's party approve of his picks at roughly the same rate as members of the winning party always have. However, members of the opposing party are usually mildly positive toward a new president's picks. Not this year. Among Democrats, only 11 percent approve of Trump's cabinet choices. This is pretty remarkable. Trump starts out with the most intense disapproval among the opposite party of any new president in recent memory. <em>By far</em> the most intense.</p>
<p>A second result is also interesting&mdash;as well as sort of amusing. In pretty much every poll ever taken, members of the president's party think the economy is stronger than members of the out party. Members of the president's party are also more likely to be optimistic about the future of the economy. <img align="right" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_economy_in_one_year_december_2016.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #d9d9d9; margin: 20px 0px 15px 30px;">This is hardly surprising, but Trump has hypercharged it. Take a look at the chart on the right.</p>
<p>Republicans are over the moon. A full 75 percent think the economy will be better in a year. Meanwhile, Democrats, who were already pessimistic, have cratered. Only 15 percent think the economy will be better a year from now.</p>
<p>Personally, I think this is too easy. Instead of blathering about something vague like "economic conditions," you should be willing to name exactly what you think will be better. For example:</p>
<ul><li>The unemployment rate is currently 4.6 percent. Higher or lower in November 2017?</li>
<li>Real GDP growth averaged (approximately) 1.6 percent in 2016. Higher or lower in 2017?</li>
<li>Real weekly wages of production and nonsupervisory employees were up (approximately) 0.41 percent in 2016. Higher or lower in 2017?</li>
</ul><p>You can pick your own examples. But they should be specific and measurable, regardless of whether you think Trump is going to supercharge the economy or destroy it.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumFri, 09 Dec 2016 03:12:51 +0000Kevin Drum321066 at http://www.motherjones.comRaw Data: If Obamacare Is Repealed, 17-37 Million People Will Lose Health Coveragehttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/raw-data-if-obamacare-repealed-17-37-million-people-will-lose-health-coverage
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>As Republicans merrily head down their stated path of repealing Obamacare without bothering to replace it, here are the <a href="http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhis/earlyrelease/insur201611.pdf" target="_blank">latest CDC numbers</a> on the uninsured:</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_cdc_uninsured_2016_june.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 15px 20px;"></p>
<p>Let's put that into raw numbers. There are currently 273 million people in America under the age of 65. If we abolished Obamacare and returned to the 2013 percentage of uninsured, 17 million people would lose health coverage.</p>
<p>And that's optimistic. If Republican recklessness causes the insurance industry to abandon the individual market altogether (<a href="http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/obamacare-repeal-doomed-pre-existing-conditions" target="_blank">explanation here</a>), the number of people who would lose coverage is somewhere in the range of 32-37 million. That's represents 22 million people who are currently in the <a href="http://kff.org/other/state-indicator/total-population/?currentTimeframe=0" target="_blank">non-group insurance market</a> plus another 10-15 million who benefited from <a href="http://acasignups.net/graphs#medicaid" target="_blank">Obamacare's Medicaid expansion.</a></p>
<p>Repealing Obamacare makes a great campaign slogan, but now Republicans have to actually govern. Do they really want to be responsible for 17-37 million people losing health coverage? Really?</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumThu, 08 Dec 2016 20:18:58 +0000Kevin Drum321031 at http://www.motherjones.comApparently the World Just Wants the Trains to Run on Timehttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/apparently-world-just-wants-trains-run-time
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>I seriously don't have the courage to click on this link, so I'll just share the tweet:</p>
<blockquote>
<blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">Share of the population who believe it is a good thing to have a 'strong leader' without elections or parliament <a href="https://t.co/6mpKbfe5Ym">https://t.co/6mpKbfe5Ym</a> <a href="https://t.co/oAVEUfuYJj">pic.twitter.com/oAVEUfuYJj</a></p>
&mdash; Pedro da Costa (@pdacosta) <a href="https://twitter.com/pdacosta/status/806895905748160512">December 8, 2016</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script></blockquote>
</blockquote>
<p>Looking for a silver lining? The US is moving toward authoritarianism slower than the other countries. And Germany, which has some recent experience with this sort of thing, remains pretty committed to elections and so forth.</p>
<p>Then again, Russia, Spain, and China have some recent experience with authoritarian governments too, and that's not stopping them from losing faith in democracy.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumThu, 08 Dec 2016 19:28:52 +0000Kevin Drum321016 at http://www.motherjones.comHow Many Generals Is Too Many?http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/how-many-generals-too-many
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p><img align="right" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_army_general_shoulder_boards.jpg" style="margin: 8px 0px 15px 30px;">Over at the <em>Washington Examiner</em>, Jamie McIntyre makes a fair point about <a href="http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/too-many-generals-trumps-newest-nomination-causing-jitters/article/2609095" target="_blank">Trump's military-heavy cabinet:</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>"I am concerned that so many of the President-Elect's nominees thus far come from the ranks of recently retired military officers," Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said in a statement Wednesday evening....Yet when President Obama assembled his Cabinet in 2009, he also ended up with three retired four-stars in his inner circle: [Jim] Jones as his national security adviser, retired Army Gen. Eric Shinseki as veterans affairs secretary, and retired Navy Adm. Dennis Blair as director of national intelligence. That's 12 stars to Trump's 11.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Technically, DNI isn't a cabinet-level position, but it's hard to argue that it's less important than, say, Secretary of the Interior. Of course, Trump still has some positions to fill, including DNI, so we might not be done with the generals yet. Still, if Trump sticks with the three he's got, it's not out of the ordinary.</p>
<p>The real issue with Trump seems to be that he's chosen a retired general to run the Department of Defense. It's reasonable to object to this, but let's just object to it, instead of claiming that Trump's cabinet is unusually heavy with ex-generals.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumThu, 08 Dec 2016 18:19:03 +0000Kevin Drum321006 at http://www.motherjones.comHere's What's Left in Trump's Little Shop of Horrorshttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/heres-whats-left-trumps-little-shop-horrors
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>In case you're keeping score at home, there are five cabinet posts left to be filled: State, Interior, Agriculture, Energy, and Veterans Affairs.</p>
<p>Plus there are three cabinet-level positions still open: Office of Management and Budget, US Trade Representative, and Council of Economic Advisors.</p>
<p>Of these, State and OMB are the most important. Veterans Affairs might be a spot for yet another general. Trade representative isn't usually a high-profile position, but might become one under Trump. The rest are offices he doesn't care about, which means they're wide open for women, minorities, and assorted billionaires.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumThu, 08 Dec 2016 17:50:56 +0000Kevin Drum321001 at http://www.motherjones.comSwamp Watch - 8 December 2016http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/swamp-watch-8-december-2016
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>Well, Donald Trump is just playing with us now. The great protector of the working class plans to nominate for Secretary of Labor&mdash;that's Secretary of <em>Labor</em>&mdash;Andrew Puzder, the wealthy CEO of a fast-food empire who doggedly opposes a wide variety of worker protections imposed by big government. He also seems to take a fairly dim view of human labor in general, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/carls-jr-wants-open-automated-location-2016-3" target="_blank">regardless of how much it costs:</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>Puzder doesn't think that it's likely that any machine could take over the more nuanced kitchen work of Carl's Jr. and Hardee's. But for more rote tasks like grilling a burger or taking an order, technology may be even more precise than human employees. <strong>"They're always polite, they always upsell, they never take a vacation, they never show up late, there's never a slip-and-fall, or an age, sex, or race discrimination case,"</strong> says Puzder of swapping employees for machines.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Puzder <a href="http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-puzder-20160322-snap-htmlstory.html" target="_blank">might not be quite as bad</a> as that quote suggests, but he's hardly a fulsome friend of the working man and woman. On the bright side, Carl's Jr. makes a good burger. If they could just improve their fries, they'd be great.</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_trump_cabinet_2016_12_08.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 5px 0px;"></p></body></html>
Kevin DrumThu, 08 Dec 2016 17:42:30 +0000Kevin Drum320996 at http://www.motherjones.comInfant Mortality Rose 1.3% Last Yearhttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/infant-mortality-rose-13-last-year
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>Today the Centers for Disease Control announced that <a href="http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db267.htm" target="_blank">life expectancy at birth declined slightly between 2014 and 2015.</a> I wonder how they calculate that? They're basically predicting death rates around the year 2100, and it hardly seems likely they can do this. My understanding is that it's based on age-specific death rates prevailing for the current year, but what makes anyone think those death rates will remain the same for the next 80 years?</p>
<p>That's a question for another blog post, I suppose. One thing is for sure, however: we can certainly take a look at death rates right now. And this, in particular, is disturbing:</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_cdc_infant_mortality_2014_2015.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #000000; margin: 15px 0px 15px 30px;"></p>
<p>Infant mortality in the US is already far higher than it is in the rest of the developed world. It's under 450 in France, Germany, and Britain, for example, and under 350 in Italy, Japan, and Norway. The only OECD countries with higher infant mortality rates have per-capita incomes less than half ours.</p>
<p>To make things worse, the rate of infant mortality among blacks is double what it is among whites and Hispanics. It's a horror story&mdash;and apparently it's getting worse. How is this possible?</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumThu, 08 Dec 2016 16:48:44 +0000Kevin Drum320991 at http://www.motherjones.comToday's Mystery Maphttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/todays-mystery-map
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>Can you guess what this map represents? In my opinion it's pretty important, and I don't think I've ever seen it anywhere else. Leave your guesses in comments. I'll provide the answer tomorrow.</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_mideast_mystery_map_0.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 5px 0px;"></p></body></html>
Kevin DrumThu, 08 Dec 2016 14:35:06 +0000Kevin Drum320976 at http://www.motherjones.comSwamp Watch - 7 December 2016http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/swamp-watch-7-december-2016-1
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p><em>Another</em> cabinet appointment today? Does Donald Trump even pretend to vet any of these folks? Beats me. But yes, there's a third appointee today: Linda McMahon, of professional wrestling fame, will head up the Small Business Administration. (This is a <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/cabinet" target="_blank">cabinet-level post,</a> so it goes on the list.) McMahon and her husband founded the WWE empire and are worth over $1 billion, so that's officially the third billionaire in his cabinet. Plus there's Trump himself, of course, so that's four. That's 0.7 percent of all the billionaires in the country&mdash;so far.</p>
<p>Among other things, the McMahons have nearly single-handedly funded the Trump Foundation since 2007. Earlier this year they gave $6 million to Trump's campaign. Normally this gets you an ambassadorship to, say, Sweden, but the McMahons are longtime pals, so Linda gets a spot in the cabinet instead. The official excuse is that she helped build the WWE from a small business into an empire, so she knows just what small businesses need. Works for me.</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_trump_cabinet_2016_12_07_2.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 5px 0px;"></p></body></html>
Kevin DrumThu, 08 Dec 2016 04:53:23 +0000Kevin Drum320971 at http://www.motherjones.comMedia Coverage of the 2016 Election Was Very, Very Negativehttp://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/media-coverage-2016-election-was-very-very-negative
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>The Shorenstein Center has published its <a href="http://shorensteincenter.org/news-coverage-2016-general-election/" target="_blank">analysis of 2016 election coverage,</a> and the main takeaway is that it was very, very negative&mdash;but not <em>uniformly</em> negative. For most of the campaign, Donald Trump's coverage was more negative than Hillary Clinton's, but that suddenly turned around&nbsp;after James Comey's letter about Clinton's email was released. In the final two weeks of the campaign, more than a third of Clinton's coverage was devoted to scandals. At the same time, coverage of Trump turned suddenly less negative.</p>
<p>The result is that during the crucial closing stretch of the campaign, Clinton's coverage was more negative than Trump's. It's hard to look at this and not conclude that Comey's letter was the key turning point that made Donald Trump president.</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_shorenstein_2016_presidential_clinton_scandal.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 15px 0px;"><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_shorenstein_2016_presidential_net_tone_0.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 15px 10px;"></p>
<p>There are lots of other interesting tidbits in the Shorenstein report, but this one in particular struck me:</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_shorenstein_presidential_positive_coverage_1960_2016.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 15px 25px;"></p>
<p>That's an astonishingly straight line. For the past half century, news coverage of presidential campaigns has gotten steadily more negative&mdash;regardless of who's running. This is disturbing. It's easy to believe that the clubby and decorous political coverage of the 50s and 60s deserved to become tougher and more candid. But this doesn't mean that ever more cynical is the right answer. Does it really stand to reason that a full <em>two-thirds</em> of the coverage of the past three elections&mdash;featuring five different candidates&mdash;has been negative? I'm hard pressed to see how.</p>
<p>Also, note that 2016 did <em>not</em> generate the most negative coverage of all time. That honor still belongs to 2000. I'm pointing this out as bait for Bob Somerby.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumThu, 08 Dec 2016 00:52:45 +0000Kevin Drum320961 at http://www.motherjones.comSwamp Watch - 7 December 2016http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/swamp-watch-7-december-2016-0
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>We have another cabinet choice: Oklahoma attorney general Scott Pruitt will lead the EPA. Pruitt is pretty much what you'd expect: he's a climate change skeptic and has <a href="https://www.edf.org/blog/2016/11/30/epa-candidate-brags-about-suing-agency-calls-climate-science-unsettled" target="_blank">led the charge</a> against pretty much every Obama initiative to protect the environment. And he's from Oklahoma, so it's hardly surprising that he's cozy with the fossil fuel industry.</p>
<p>In a controversial decision, the judges here at blog headquarters have named Pruitt the first Trump nominee who's neither part of the swamp nor rich, crazy, or scary. Pruitt is a state official, so he's not part of the DC swamp. And his climate skepticism and hatred of all environmental rules is pretty mainstream for Republicans. That's scary, of course, but the title is reserved for those who are scary far beyond just being folks that liberals don't like.</p>
<p>This prompts a question: if you could wave a magic wand and dump either Steve Bannon or Michael Flynn from Trump's staff, which would you choose? I'd choose Flynn.</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_trump_cabinet_2016_12_07_1.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 5px 0px;"></p></body></html>
Kevin DrumWed, 07 Dec 2016 20:07:31 +0000Kevin Drum320946 at http://www.motherjones.comDonald Trump's Pick To Head The EPA Is "An Existential Threat To The Planet"http://www.motherjones.com/contributor/2016/12/scott-pruitt-epa-disaster
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>Donald Trump's transition team has announced that the next <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/07/us/politics/scott-pruitt-epa-trump.html" target="_blank">head of the EPA will be Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt</a>. This is very bad news!</p>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">At the risk of being dramatic. Scott Pruitt at EPA is an existential threat to the planet</p>
&mdash; Dan Pfeiffer (@danpfeiffer) <a href="https://twitter.com/danpfeiffer/status/806577537379926017">December 7, 2016</a></blockquote>
<p><script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>As my colleague Jeremy Shulman <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2016/11/climate-deniers-trump-administration" target="_blank">noted earlier this year</a>, Pruitt has some very dumb views about climate change.:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Views on climate change: "The EPA does not possess the authority under the Clean Air Act to accomplish what it proposes in the unlawful Clean Power Plan. The EPA is ignoring the authority granted by Congress to states to regulate power plant emissions at their source. The Clean Power Plan is an unlawful attempt to expand federal bureaucrats' authority over states' energy economies in order to shutter coal-fired power plants and eventually other sources of fossil-fuel generated electricity." [Pruitt press release, 7/1/15]</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Writing in <em>National Review</em> year, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/article/435470/climate-change-attorneys-general" target="_blank">Pruitt blathered</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Scientists continue to disagree about the degree and extent of global warming and its connection to the actions of mankind. That debate should be encouraged &mdash; in classrooms, public forums, and the halls of Congress.</p>
</blockquote>
<p><em>Think Progress</em> has <a href="https://thinkprogress.org/scott-pruitt-rip-epa-e8ed87fa6346#.5uolgcmyk" target="_blank">many more reasons why Pruitt at the EPA is a disaster</a>.</p></body></html>
ContributorClimate ChangeWed, 07 Dec 2016 19:51:43 +0000Ben Dreyfuss320936 at http://www.motherjones.comThe North Pole Is In Big Trouble. So Is the South Pole.http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/north-pole-big-trouble-so-south-pole
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>For years, climate deniers have been producing charts that <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2015/01/will-2014-finally-be-year-puts-climate-change-denialist-1998-chestnut-rest" target="_blank">use the El Ni&ntilde;o year of 1998 as a starting point.</a> Why? Because it was an unusually hot year, and if you start there it looks like global warming has "paused" for a good long time. Here's a <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2217286/Global-warming-stopped-16-years-ago-reveals-Met-Office-report-quietly-released--chart-prove-it.html" target="_blank">colorful example of the genre</a> from the <em>Daily Mail</em> a few years ago:</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_daily_mail_plateau.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #000000; margin: 15px 0px 15px 60px;"></p>
<p>These charts are no longer useful to the deniers thanks to the very high temperatures of the past couple of years, so they've gone away. But what will take their place? I was amused to discover the answer a few days ago: <em>2016 doesn't mean anything because it was an El Ni&ntilde;o year.</em></p>
<p>Hah! Nobody ever said they didn't have chutzpah. But it got me curious: what does a global temperature chart look like if you pull out just the El Ni&ntilde;o and La Ni&ntilde;a years? That seemed like a lot of work to get right, so I put it aside. Today, however, I found out that someone else had already done it for me. Here it is:</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_climate_change_el_nino_1.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #000000; margin: 15px 0px 15px 60px;"></p>
<p>This comes from a Weather Channel piece titled <a href="https://weather.com/news/news/breitbart-misleads-americans-climate-change" target="_blank">"Note to Breitbart: Earth Is Not Cooling, Climate Change Is Real and Please Stop Using Our Video to Mislead Americans."</a> The chart itself apparently comes from skepticalscience.com, but I can't figure out exactly where to link to it. <em>[UPDATE: <a href="http://www.skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=67" target="_blank">Here it is.</a> It's an animated GIF!]</em> However, it shows the historical data clearly: El Ni&ntilde;o years (in red) are always hot, but have been getting steadily hotter. La Ni&ntilde;a years (in blue) are always cool, but have also been getting steadily hotter. And the years in-between (in black) have been getting steadily hotter too. Long story short, every kind of year has been getting steadily hotter for a long time.</p>
<p>And this year is a real champ. Here's the latest <a href="http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/" target="_blank">from the National Snow and Ice Data Center:</a></p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_arctic_sea_ice_1978_2016_0.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 15px 0px;"><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_antarctic_sea_ice_1978_2016_1.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 15px 10px;"></p>
<p>Both poles are showing massive ice loss compared to trend. We've never seen anything like it. You can draw all the misleading charts you want, but it doesn't change the facts. Climate change is real, and it's getting worse.</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumWed, 07 Dec 2016 19:07:19 +0000Kevin Drum320886 at http://www.motherjones.comIs the Military Reluctant to Support the Use of Force?http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/military-reluctant-support-use-force
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p>Retired Gen. Charles Dunlap says we shouldn't be too worried about all the generals that Donald Trump is <a href="http://www.vox.com/world/2016/12/7/13868622/trump-mattis-general-colin-powell-mad-dog-petraeus" target="_blank">picking for his cabinet:</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>Many in the civilian world misunderstand the ways most generals see the world....<strong>Retired generals don&rsquo;t clamor for war; they are typically the voices urging that all other avenues be exhausted before turning to force.</strong></p>
<p>As chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, then-Army Gen. Colin Powell authored a thoughtful but tempered use-of-force doctrine that said America should only go to war with defined objectives and a clear exit strategy. It was designed to persuade civilian policymakers to be extremely cautious about ordering troops into battle. It didn&rsquo;t work, <strong>and true &ldquo;hawks&rdquo; of Powell&rsquo;s tenure often proved to be high-ranking civilian officials with liberal political leanings.</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<p>My sense is that this is true. But that doesn't mean it is, of course. Maybe my sense is wrong. I'd like to hear more about this from both civilian and military folks who have held high-ranking positions in previous administrations. When it comes to the use of force, are ex-generals generally voices of moderation?</p></body></html>
Kevin DrumWed, 07 Dec 2016 17:53:54 +0000Kevin Drum320866 at http://www.motherjones.comSwamp Watch - 7 December 2016http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/12/swamp-watch-7-december-2016
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">
<html><body><p><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/07/us/politics/john-kelly-dhs-trump.html?smid=tw-share&amp;_r=0" target="_blank">The <em>New York Times</em> reports</a> that Donald Trump plans to name Gen. John Kelly, a retired four-star Marine general, as Secretary of Homeland Security. That makes three generals so far in his cabinet: Flynn, Mattis,<sup>1</sup> and Kelly. That's a lot of generals, no? Especially for a guy who <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/11/tomdispatch-US-military-war-donald-trump-generals" target="_blank">trashed America's generals</a> during the campaign because "they haven't done the job." I guess he changed his mind.</p>
<p><sup>1</sup>Who Trump continues to call "Mad Dog" at every possible opportunity.</p>
<p><img align="middle" alt="" class="image image-_original" src="/files/blog_trump_cabinet_2016_12_07.jpg" style="margin: 15px 0px 5px 0px;"></p></body></html>
Kevin DrumWed, 07 Dec 2016 16:45:36 +0000Kevin Drum320861 at http://www.motherjones.com